Once one of China's most powerful leaders, former domestic security chief Zhou Yongkang was arrested early Saturday and expelled from the Communist Party.

Zhou was charged with a lengthy list of corruption, and other, infractions, including taking pay-offs and selling state secrets.

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If convicted, and party officials almost always are when charged, Zhou would represent the highest-ranking Chinese leader sent to prison in more than 20 years.

For more than two years, Zhou has been under the gun with his high profile case the subject of intense negotiations between rival internal political faction.

Top officials Saturday handed the agreed-upon charges, of which there were many, to the court system and announced the move through a commentary in the official Xinhua news agency.

Some of the more spectacular accusations involved included channeling money to relatives and mistresses while taking gigantic bribes, disclosing state secrets and abusing his office for special interests. Earlier this year, china seized $14.4 billion in assets from Zhou, his family and associates

The move represented yet another sign that President Xi Jinping had assumed full control of governmental leadership and his anti-corruption drive had serious teeth. Xi even set aside the major unwritten Party rule that past, and current, members of the Politburo's standing committee were exempt from discipline.

For most of the last decade, Zhou was one China's most powerful leaders. His hand was in every aspect of state security. He controlled the state's lucrative oil sector. He was a member of the powerful Politburo standing committee until two years ago.

Similar to the U.S. when major stories sometimes are held until Sunday when less media attention is focused, Chinese leaders tend to hold on to major announcements until late Friday. In Zhou's case, details of his arrest and party expulsion were released just minutes after midnight on Saturday by Xinhua news agency.

In making the announcement through a commentary posting, Xinhua said the Communist Party "sticks to the principle that everyone is equal before the law and nothing is off-limits in fighting corruption."

Xinhua said Zhou had deviated from the Party's nature and purpose, adding his actions had damaged badly the Party and Chinese people and "the impacts are extremely bad."

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